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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26183986">Need no past</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyFeathers/pseuds/GalaxyFeathers'>GalaxyFeathers</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The line between you and I [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Xenoblade Chronicles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Minor Character Death, Ose Tower, Spoilers, i'm only tagging major character death bc its. its uh the Important Ose Tower Thing, let's all watch zanza go a bit feral</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 05:14:22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>572</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26183986</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyFeathers/pseuds/GalaxyFeathers</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Memories are a fickle thing.</i><br/>In his desperation for ether, Zanza makes a hasty mistake.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The line between you and I [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1901485</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Need no past</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Stole a line from 'Leave My Body' by Florence and the Machine for the title</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div>
<p></p><div><p>Memories were a fickle thing.</p></div><div><p>Childhood memories were lost to time, old memories cleared away for new ones.</p></div><div><p>They were the basis of an identity, the sense of 'yourself.'</p></div><div><p>Zanza knew this all too well. The concept formed part of his method of survival. He selected a vessel, and when they touched the Monado, he overwrote their memories with his own, transferring himself to his new body.</p></div><div><p>It was flawless, he believed. It could never fail, and it never had failed before. </p></div><hr/>
<p></p><div><p>Zanza didn't expect being locked away to eat away at him so much.</p></div><div><p>He had intended to sleep during his wait for his next vessel. But he found himself awake more often than he'd like, forcing him to endure the ever growing hunger for ether and the slow, slow passage of time.</p></div><div><p>He couldn't escape it, his soul stuck without a body, his current vessel chained up on Prison Island, memories scattered across the two.</p></div><div><p>Desperation grew as he fell in and out of awareness. </p></div><div><p>
      <em>How much longer? I need ether.</em>
    </p></div><div><p>
      <em>Did the vision lie? I refuse to waste away like this.</em>
    </p></div><div><p>
      <em>I need ether. I need a body.</em>
    </p></div><div><p>Centuries upon centuries piled up. He couldn't even try to scream or claw his way out in frustration; without a body, he was limited to the Monado itself, and even that could do nothing but hum while he was without a body.</p></div><div><p><em>I'm so hungry</em>. </p></div><div><p>Finally, finally, the door of his prison creaked open. It startled him awake, just enough to start sensing their ether. He felt his vessel among them. He tugged at the vessel's mind, commanding it forward, demanding it touch the Monado. Someone shouted at the child to stop.</p></div><div><p>
      <em>Closer, closer, I need ether!</em>
    </p></div><div><p>He felt a small hand brush the bottom of the hilt, and it was enough.</p></div><div><p>In an instant, the boy was drained of ether. Then, through the body, Zanza channeled the ether of the other Homs into himself. One by one, the Homs in the room dropped to the ground, their lives consumed too fast to even attempt escape.</p></div><div><p>
      <em>The body, my body, finally!</em>
    </p></div><div><p>Zanza knew he was supposed to be careful, when transferring his soul. But he didn't care, not now, not when he finally had a new flesh and blood body. So what if it was still a child? So what if he should have kept it alive throughout the process? He could finally escape the confines of that blade, damn the risks.</p></div><div><p>He funneled his soul into the boy, and immediately felt the limitations posed by the child. It no longer held a soul to overwrite, and the child could not yet store as many memories as he would like. Not that it stopped him, in his blind desperation, from trying to fully possess the child. He relished the feeling of air rushing into small lungs, a heart pumping blood through veins, eyes that could gaze up to the sparking Monado.</p></div><div><p>Zanza laughed, delirious from the rush of life. He was alive! No longer little more than a ghost attached to a divine blade!</p></div><div><p>The body swayed, fog crept over his mind, but he didn't care. He didn't care that it was getting harder and harder to remember what he should be doing, or even why he was here.</p></div><div><p>He sunk to the ground, still laughing, accepting the darkness of sleep overtaking him. He was alive, and that's all that mattered.</p></div></div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Are you ready for me to obsessively write this shiny new au of mine?<br/>Please feel free to comment! I love getting comments. I'm planning on writing and posting more of this au in this series, so subscribe to that if you want!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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